Best: The Logistics of Battling Your Doppelganger
I know this column has already been rife with nerdy/obscure LitCrit references, but I would be completely remiss if I said I wasn’t really hoping that when the 2 Sin Caras…s touched we would be treated to some sorta Time Cop/Blinovitch Time Effect and they’d both shriek out of existence in a ball of blinding light.
What we got instead was a teeny bit of good lucha, because it felt like they finally paired Mistico with someone who actually SPOKE HIS F*CKING LANGUAGE! I don’t just mean Spanish, I meant someone who’s actually spent time down in Mexico learning the trade. Indie style isn’t Lucha just like Llave isn’t PuroRes and the quicker people in WWE management learn this, the quicker they’ll find a solution to keeping a popular Mexican star on their roster without having all his matches look like a pile of garbled shit. Instead they seem content with sticking him in matches against Daniel Bryan or Evan Bourne and throwing their hands up in contempt when it doesn’t go smooth as virgin cream.
This isn’t a complaint. I’m looking forward to this storyline and match slightly more than I did Taker vs. Taker and just slightly less than Doug vs. Rigby.

Worst: Cody Rhodes
Literally, the people in charge of handing out custom fabricated paper bags, the people who fabricate the bags and the people in charge of moving and removing Sin Cara’s trampoline had more to do this week than Cody Rhodes. Rhodes is a talent with an an interesting gimmick and this isn’t how he should be used. I will however say that if the eventual loser of the Battle-to-Not-Have-a-Face ends with Sin Cara Dos having to wear a paper bag on his head like Spidey that one time when he split from 4 Freedom Plaza, I would cry in delight.
Disappointed, wistful delight.

Super Very Double Best: the Awesome Truth
Miz and R-Truth are on an absolute tear, and it feels like people aren’t noticing.
I write this aware that when CM Punk delivered his fourth-wall shredding promo 3 months ago, it genuinely changed perception about wrestling. I’ve tried to explain this to non-fans, and the best thing I could come up with was a rough analogy to comic books in the 80’s. I would tell people that when Alan Moore did Watchmen (of course) and Swamp Thing (more importantly), along with half a dozen other important guys thinking outside of the box, they were able to actually raise the public perception of the medium. Comics were seen as strictly kids stuff for decades, and now colleges teach courses with ‘Human Anatomy’ and ‘the Coyote Gospel’ as required reading. There exists, within the purview of Pro Wrestling, a means to elevate out of the muck and mire of being just for kids and idiots.
This is what that moment of cultural relevance that CM Punk received was about. And it’s a real shame that I see it rescinding just as quickly. Critics were quick to praise fourth-wall-breaking, but are missing the Miz and R-Truth elevating their performances within the context of just being WWE Superstars. Tonight, they delivered heartfelt, believable moments of remorse over their actions and fear about the consequences. It was good and engaging, and if I was a 10-year-old kid watching it, it’s the kind of stuff that would get me locked in for life. If the WWE isn’t capable of delivering reality the way that, say, the UFC can, they can deliver interesting and believable fiction the way that UFC can’t, specifically when they’re trying to convince me that Rashad Evans and Jon Jones really hate each other. This is the beauty of American pro wrestling, and sometimes I worry that it’s a dying art.

Join The Discussion

This is like when you buy coke that’s not from your regular guy. It’s not like the stuff you’re used to, but in the end you’re still really happy to have coke.

I’m just happy to have a RAW recap.

09.20.11 at 5:52 pm

Andrew Johnson

“…we should at least acknowledge that CM Punk gets to be Ben Grimm, Sheamus is Terrax the Destroyer, and Mark Henry is a character I’m gonna call B’lactus.”

This is why you are better than me. THIS.

*Hails cab, flips you off as it drives away*

Well done.

09.20.11 at 5:56 pm

Panther Joe

Your steak analogy would have been better, if, say, you hadn’t proclaimed yourself to be a vegan in the first couple of sentences. It’s not a badge of honor, hipsters.

09.20.11 at 5:57 pm

statutory bliss

“if you took an .mp3 of Beth Pheonix’s music, stripped the tags and released it on the internet as a leaked M83 single, Pitchfork would be writing a review about it tomorrow morning”

too damn funny

09.20.11 at 5:59 pm

B'lactus

Mark Henry is a character I’m gonna call B’lactus.
=================================
This is my new name from now on.

Diego, this was an awesome recap for a nerd/geek such as myself. Thanks.

09.20.11 at 6:04 pm

Huh

I don’t like Kanye…not because he is an asshole but because he sucks.

George Bush doesn’t care about black people

09.20.11 at 6:10 pm

Jack

Enjoyed the article.

09.20.11 at 6:13 pm

statutory bliss

wait… but your only defense here is kanye being an asshole.
sucks doesnt really jibe with the fact that he’s released 4 of the greatest rap albums of all time.

09.20.11 at 6:18 pm

C. J. Bradford

This was posted, and then not posted, and then re-posted, right? Or am I just completely crazy? (or both).
Perfect recap. If I had to vote, you would win the Guests of b/w. The round up at the end was spot on. A great show, equal in plot lines and wrestling, and could just possibly be leading to something even better. Which is surprising considering we just came from a month of BLAH and a PPV of EH. I won’t be able to convince anyone, but HHH isn’t all that bad. I get he pisses people off, and he has the subtly of…well of a sledgehammer. But he has been pushing the story as well as anyone could. That’s just me, though.

And side note, @heelziggler says he has a possible fractured jaw. To be taken with a grain of salt, but it’s possible he wasn’t selling.

/John Cena is the third stomach of the steak analogy

09.20.11 at 6:33 pm

NumberJohnny5

“doesnt really jibe with the fact that he’s released 4 of the greatest rap albums of all time”

Except that

1. Everyone has different tastes when it comes to music.

and

2. They’re not.

Fuck Kanye, dude should stick to producing.

09.20.11 at 6:42 pm

Dyno-Mite

“It was the greatest performance I’d seen from a commentator since Michael Cole lost his voice at Night of Champions and was forced to just shut the f*ck up for the last hour.”

Brilliant stuff. I hope you get chance to come back. Loved the geeky references.

09.20.11 at 6:48 pm

Keyser Sosa

I got all excited when I saw that there were 9 pages to your B/W and I had something to entertain me at work. But then I saw how short each page was. It’s kind of like when you procrastinated too long in college and tried to squeak out an extra page on a paper by 2.5 spacing the lines…

Great job though man, I enjoyed it.

09.20.11 at 6:48 pm

Diego's English Professor

Well… soon, I’ll be a dangling participle.

*kicks out stool

09.20.11 at 6:49 pm

Sully

“If the WWE isn’t capable of delivering reality the way that, say, the UFC can, they can deliver interesting and believable fiction the way that UFC can’t”

This is the kind of pro wrestling analysis I enjoy reading, because it so easily summarizes how I’ve been trying to explain it to people, except I do it so much more clumsily and use words like “microcosm” until people I talk to roll their eyes and go back to reading the New Yorker or whatever the hell it is people who think they’re too cool for school read these days.

09.20.11 at 6:52 pm

Mike

you were Dr. Cube!!!!

09.20.11 at 6:57 pm

Slideshow Bob

atleast in Street Fighter when Ken fought himself theyd hav the decency to hav player 2 wear a blue Gui (however thats spelled), If both Sin Caras wear the exact same outfit its gonna be really confusing to watch.

09.20.11 at 7:01 pm

jrkumor

Go Diego Go! Go Diego Go! I am so happy to know someone in real life writing for the Uproxx Lords!

PS. If I knew anything at all about WWE, and I mean anything, I am sure I would love this.

09.20.11 at 7:58 pm

Cole

So I’m not the only one bothered by the Latin. Vocare ad Regnum means “Call to the Kingdom. I’m 90% sure he’s trying to say “Hail to the King” but that would be Salve Regi

09.20.11 at 8:06 pm

907

I enjoyed it. The column, I mean, not the show.

09.20.11 at 8:06 pm

Joseph A

Do you still have your picture with Ultramantis Black from King of Trios?

09.20.11 at 8:21 pm

Larry Dickman

I think there should be an additional best for the guy screaming “GET MICHALE COLE TOO” at Mark Henry after he destroyed Lawler

09.20.11 at 9:01 pm

BellyBillboard

I gotta say, this is a good article. Some of the references seem to be a reach, but hell, I enjoyed reading it none the less. Good job on this.

Also, points for bringing up the backstage segment to end the show. Everyone just sitting together in a few folding chairs in front of one TV monitor, when you’ve seen at least 6 other monitors backstage during different promos. Just like an Elementary School play….everyone shuffles in and watches together. One big happy dysfunctional family.

“I think there should be an additional best for the guy screaming “GET MICHALE COLE TOO” at Mark Henry after he destroyed Lawler”
Agreed

I liked this review the best of any I’ve read on this site, Brandon is good but I liked this better. You should write Smackdown columns every week.

09.20.11 at 10:37 pm

chrishaley

This was great. Well done, Diego.

09.20.11 at 11:32 pm

SavetoFavorites

my English professor just closed the webpage for this article in disgust, and then hung himself

And then he did it again. Only this time, he hanged himself.

09.20.11 at 11:37 pm

Public Frenemy

@Mack: Yes, he was referring to Luda’s album. Child Of The Night was, and still is, the shit. Also, I’m not going to begrudge any artist’s success, even fucking Coldplay’s, if (almost) every album they release makes buttloads of cash. I love Kanye, and if you don’t then I arbitrarily detest whoever your favorite singer is, because FUCK YOU, that’s why.

Thank you to everyone who’s left comments. All joking aside, all feedback is greatly appreciated and flattering (even the ones pointing out my grammar woes).
And yeah, definitely shouting out that Luda album.
George Bush doesn’t care about B’lactus.

09.21.11 at 12:56 am

monkeytorture

This was all really bad. You’re honestly trying to tell me that:
-burying the guy who’s created more buzz for you in years (cmpunk, losing to del rio, cena, and then, of course, jobbing to hhh in the last month)
-“firing” the two next best and most entertaining guys on the roster (miz and r-truth, just to farther exemplify HHH’s dominance)
-taking the title off the next best guy after that (alberto del rio, who’s character was completely changed once cena was named #1 contender for whatever reason)
As reason to believe wwe creative might be going somewhere with this?

Seriously, brandon, where did you get this guy from? Does he work for wwe? This raw was terrible, and no amount of this guy’s spin can change that.

Also, anybody who’s super impressed with comparative references can watch the family guy marathon on tbs. Brandon can get away with it because he provides some actual insight (although even he pushes it by bragging about what references he shoehorned in on twitter). But come on man, openly seeking appplause because you squeezed a variety of forced references. (And then immediately pointing it out) is lame as all hell.

Seriously, I do regularly enjoy these recaps, and the guy who did NOC was good. I don’t know how this guy thought submitting this column was the best he could do.

Also, alex riley is the worst, and no one should ever say otherwise. And fully admitting you didn’t feel like rewriting a part of a column because you guessed wrong proves you couldn’t handle this in the first place.

09.21.11 at 1:19 am

M4G3RK

I also noticed that Jackman potato’d Ziggler. I called it out to my semi-concious wife who was awakened earlier from her sleep when I squeeled like a little girl when Jackman got the Ryder>Wolverine poster.

I think B’lactus saved the whole article.

09.21.11 at 2:28 am

Breakfast

@monkeytorture: Sigh. Where to start.

You really think they’re burying Punk? The guy who started the show on the mic, was then placed in a main event title match at the next PPV, and then ended the show with a main event victory?

You actually think the Miz and Truth have been fired from the company? Like, ACTUALLY actually? You don’t think this could be the start of a big angle involving them and the self-appointed Most Important Guy in the Company (Triple H)?

Taking the belt off Del Rio is less defensible (see: Andrew Johnson’s bit yesterday about stripping it off him after the trip through Mexico wrapped up), but he’s in that same main event for the belt at Hell in the Cell. I’d also like a bullet point list of all the ways his character has changed since he lost the belt to Cena. Whenever you get a chance!

Writing with apt comparative references (or even just silly this-is-such-a-stretch-but-whatever comparative references) takes creativity and skill. I hope you understand that comparing Diego McCafferty’s writing style to Family Guy is an example of a bad comparative reference, and that all of this is an example of irony.

But you’ll probably just choose to be angry, which is fine. Start your own blog and see how far you get with that.

I may be crazy but did Ziggler confuse Jackman with Christian Bale during his promo? I could havd sworn the first reference he made was about that meltdown on the set of Batman.

All in all, I guess I was hoping for a worst regarding that, but your Guile idea for AirBoom more than made up for it.

09.21.11 at 9:47 am

Brian G

Easily the best of the two guest recaps. I’d gladly welcome back The Cube again. (Hypercube?)

09.21.11 at 9:57 am

Tom from West Chester

@Hey! You Wrestler- Ziggler defininitely made reference to Christian Bale during his bit with Jackman, but I thought it was intentional.

I enjoyed the recap, but there was one “Best” or at least “Improved” I didn’t see mentioned. Cole toned it down a lot this week. He apologized to JR for stepping over his lines at one point. The commentary was much less annoying this week.

One more thing I notice during the opening segment, I felt like I was rewatching the Mick Foley investigation into who ran over Austin, but with Punk as Tom Servo making hand gestures in the corner of my screen.

09.21.11 at 10:16 am

FSJ

This was one of my favorite of these so far, because I don’t know dick about wrestling and this explained why I should give it my time. Also, very funny.

09.21.11 at 10:48 am

monkeytorture

@breakfast

First off, I will admit there was probably a little more venom than necessary in my post. I was a little drunk. I will clarify some remarks.

Second, saying “go start your own blog” or such things is ridiculous. We are encouraged to comment. That’s the point of a comment section. There is nothing that says all comments have to be “oh my god, that was so awesome.” And I have posted very positive things on other posts. I had fundamental disagreements with many things the author wrote, and my main point was, “brandon and andrew are significantly better.”

The thing with the references is this: they are fine, but they shouldn’t be the main selling point of a wrestling article. He seemed to call attention to that a little too much for my liking. And things like Family Guy and Bill Simmons are exactly why this style of writing has become so popular. A subtle analogy is great. Saying, “Did you see that thing I just referenced?!” is Family Guy.

With Miz and R-Truth, I put “firing” in quotes for a reason. I know they are still employed by the WWE. My point is, why not have them be a team that can, I don’t know, beat people and whatnot instead of having them shooed away into a repetitive angle we’ve seen a number of times this year.

You really think there is no significance to HHH beating Punk? Its a classic “yeah you may be hot now, but you’re still not beating HHH” move that reasserts HHH’s dominance.

Del Rio went from being a ruthless villain who could kick anybody’s ass and just assumed everybody thought he was as great as he did to “why are you guys all making fun of me?” and running from Cena at all costs. Seems like a big change to me.

And there is nothing anybody can say to change the fact that Alex Riley is absolutely terrible. And the whole “I had this section written but then they didn’t use him so I’m just gonna complain about it” was really lame, and I think that’s what bothers me the most. That’s just terribly lazy.

09.21.11 at 10:54 am

Brandon

For the record, I think Diego did a great job, and wouldn’t have asked him to fill in if I thought he’d write it up exactly like me. I really appreciated some of the more abstract moments of the report. Pretty sad I missed an Alex Riley-free episode of Raw.

09.21.11 at 12:24 pm

WhatYeahOkay

This got a little deep on nerd roads I usually don’t traverse, but it definitely cuts the mustard.

B’lactus for COO.

Lobster head and too many limes signs FTW.

09.21.11 at 12:56 pm

Matt G.

Ohmygod. An M83/Pitchfork reference in wrestling recap. This is some high-brow shit on some low-brow shit.

09.21.11 at 1:02 pm

FramersMain

Good job, Diego! There were a few off-the-beaten path lines, but I enjoyed the column.

The idea of wrestling as means to a very unique narrative is what really, really interests me in it. I’d love if WWE simultaneously played up a fake structure of sport (fines and winner’s purses and such) and also told same damn stories about it.

Something like a live version of a Friday Night Lights. Tell stories that happen to be about professional fighters.

09.21.11 at 2:20 pm

Nicholas

Loved this. I love it every week, and this did not let the side down.

Sidenote: I have a Dr Cube shirt that I wear all the goddamn time, especially at my band’s gigs. No one has recognized it yet, because they are all Philistines.

09.21.11 at 3:01 pm

Philip

Good job!

09.21.11 at 3:34 pm

Jacktion!

Kaiju Big Battel gay

I’m just saying that because I’m kinda starstruck right now.

Will you sign my girlfriend?

09.21.11 at 3:47 pm

Breakfast

@monkeytorture

And I was drunk when I wrote my rebuttal! What an age we live in.

You are of course entitled to your opinion and, yes, this is exactly where it should be expressed. Thanks for being a bit more diplomatic in your follow up, but I still disagree with just about everything you said. Except that you probably don’t need to start a blog.

Most of all, I just don’t understand what’s “lazy” about doing preemptive work. I know that if I were given the opportunity to write a B/W, which requires a ton of writing in a very short window of time, I’d probably try to come up with as many points/jokes/analogies as I could before Raw even hit the air. Especially since the WWE likes to shove the same guys onto the ramp week after week (see: A-Ry every week for the past two months up until this week). He wanted to do a good job, got a little overzealous, and it bit him in the ass.

It’s funny to me that you wrote “there is nothing anybody can say to change the fact that Alex Riley is absolutely terrible,” since Diego opened that section with “I dislike Alex Riley as much as possible.” He wasn’t complaining about a lack of Alex Reilly because he likes Alex Reilly. He was upset because he had prepared 600 words about Alex Riley and then couldn’t use them. Relating that story wasn’t lazy, it was funny. To me, and apparently not to you.

09.21.11 at 8:09 pm

monkeytorture

@breakfast

Haha, I guess its never the best idea to drink and post!

I get your point about the preemptive work. My issue is not so much with the preemptive writing (I agree with you on that, it is good to be prepared), but I do still think coming up with a new thing (although difficult) would’ve been better. I don’t think he is a bad writer, and I’m sure he will get better. I guess with deadlines and all you can only do so much.

And hey, if there weren’t wild disagreements about over-muscled guys pretending to be other guys pretending to fight…there’d be no point to wrestling, right?

Gotta say… Cole got a chuckle out of me when he said that “The Cougar meets The Wolverine” line.

09.22.11 at 5:16 pm

jonaahhhhhh

My biggest problem with this article is that Beth Phoenix’s entrance music sounds nothing like M83, and is not shoegaze.

09.23.11 at 1:53 pm

LastTexansFan

I loved “this is where you beg for yo life.”

09.23.11 at 1:54 pm

Bishop

Ok so from watching the clip the only reason the Sin Cara feud is happening is to white wash the botches by having the “Heel” Sin Cara intentionally botching his matches (frankly you watch some there are a lot of delayed selling that looks so bad it has to be planned) and doing dishonorable things like attacking his opponents after the match. Now the “face” Sin Cara (which in Spanish would be what? “La Cara Sin Cara”) comes out and says “hey wait a min im not an incompetent wrestler its this fraud whose been messing up trying to make me look bad”. But since he cant talk all you get is standing in a ring slapping his chest and raising his arm. Or Maybe I’m giving WWE Creative too much credit…

09.23.11 at 4:52 pm

Sam Losco

I actually really enjoyed this recap. Of course Brandon is the undisputed king of these, but this one by Diego was good. I preferred it to the NoC recap, in fact. Still, the writing can’t completely make up for an awful episode of Raw.